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Fri Jul 20, 2012 5:38 pm

I have a '73 1600 that needs to be brought back to life. Has been sitting for about 10 years. Guy I got it from thought it might have dropped a valve but had not done anything with it.

We pulled the plugs and it spins pretty easy but it will only spin a half revolution and then locks hard. It doesn't sinch up or tighten up, it is a very abrupt stop. I can rotate in the other direction 180 degrees in the other direction it does the same thing.

My son and I just put a new head on my daughters BMW 525i for our first project and this is project number 2. We just followed directions on the BMW but are kind of scratching our heads on where to start with this one.

Any help is appreciated.

Fri Jul 20, 2012 5:51 pm

Something may be in that combustion chamber, whether it's a valve or a marble some kid dropped in there with the air-cleaner or carb off.

I would start by taking getting a repair manual. Bentley, Hanes, Chilton, you get the idea, right? For beginners I recoment Hanes. But for those that are mechanical minded and can do it all Bentley may be better.

Next, start by taking off the heads. When I first got my Bug I overheated it (boiling oil!) because it lacked half the cooling shrouds. (I guess they were put on there for a reason after all. Hehe!) All I basically did to it was put on all the missing shrouds and put on a free pair of heads from my uncle. You'll probably find it in the heads.

Fri Jul 20, 2012 5:53 pm

get the bentley(orange) manual, or at least the haynes manual

I would pull the engine, pull the heads off, and then try to rotate the engine

if it was a dropped or broken valve, then you should be able to spin it the full 360 no problem

if it still binds, pull the pistons and cylinders(make sure you keep them matched, I like to write the cylinder number on the piston with an arrow that points to the flywheel), and again rotate(hold onto the rods so they don't catch on the case)

if that still doesn't solve it, then I would start tearing into the engine

Fri Jul 20, 2012 5:57 pm

thanks - i'll get right to work.

Fri Jul 20, 2012 9:13 pm

ok guys - reading through the haynes manual and to get to the torque converter bolts I need to rotate the engine. If I can only rotate through 180 degrees how can I get to all 4 bolts?

Fri Jul 20, 2012 10:00 pm

Good question. You can remove the heads with the motor in the car. I've done this before when I was renting - landlord said working on the car was ok as long as I didn't remove the motor. So I put on the new heads with the motor in the car. It ain't easy but its the only way I know of to deal with a partially frozen motor in an auto stick. The hardest part was removing the fan housing since it was a 68 1500 with the non-dog house oil cooler.

Maybe someone knows of a trick to remove those bolts?

Fri Jul 20, 2012 11:32 pm

180 degrees is enough to bring the top bolt to the bottom and the other two are at 90... what's the problem?

Or am I missing something... :?

Is this a trick math question? Because I suck at math! :D

Sat Jul 21, 2012 8:51 am

Well it would appear if I only can get a half turn on the motor that atleast one of the bolts is not going to be accessable, unless there is an access hole on both sides of the motor but that does not look to be the case.

The bentley manual says I can pull the motor without removing these bolts but I will destroy the converter seal. Got to do what you got to do, eh?

Sat Jul 21, 2012 1:22 pm

Try taking the heads off first with the engine in the vehicle. If the problem is in the heads then you should be able to rotate the engine once the heads are off. :D

If it is internal then you may have to wreck that seal. :(

Sat Jul 21, 2012 2:08 pm

well - got it off with no apparent damage that I can see. We'll get the heads off and see what is up. Looks like some peanuts in one of the heater ducts. Hopefully some critter has dropped something down in there that we can fish out and get this baby rolling again.